The House of Representatives (Deputies) witnessed a real embarrassment after the Media lawwhich was close to being approved, failed because the ruling party forgot to vote for the extension of the session schedule, forcing President Ana Olivera to lift the session.
Deputy Juan Martin Rodriguez of the National Party (PN) spoke at 8:00 p.m., just before the end of the session and it continued until 8:04 p.m. The deputy M. Eugenia Roselló of the Colorado Party (PC) handed in the signature of the motion to extend the end time of the session after the hour, something that generated murmurs in the bench of the Broad Front (FA).
He Frente Amplio legislator Carlos Varela He took the floor and said: “We may have the will to approve this, but we are outside the rules. This should have been voted on before 8:00 p.m., therefore, from our point of view, the session should be adjourned.” Varela’s comment generated new comments on the sly in the chamber.
For her part, President Ana Olivera, also from the FA, clarified that she did not intend for the session to run out without reaching a vote. “First of all, I did not do it for fun, I want to make that clear,” she emphasized in this regard.
“The second thing is that when they came to tell me it was 08:00 (PM), it was already 08:00 and (Rodríguez) was speaking, maybe I should have interrupted him, but anyway, we have to adjourn the session,” he commented.
After this, the noise increased in the House of Representatives and Roselló approached Olivera to complain that she had indeed presented the motion before the end of the session, to which the president replied sharply: “You did not sign it before 08:00. It was not like that.”
The discussion between Olivera and Roselló intensified in the following moments, until Rodríguez also approached where she was. In the face of some shouts between the ruling party and the opposition, the president raised her tone: “Sorry, sorry, the mistake was mine, I regret that they did not inform me in time. I say this with sincerity, I accept it. Therefore, we adjourn the session and we meet at 01:00 in the morning.”
“When we gather the signatures, we will have the call,” Olivera concluded before ringing the bell, whose noise level was still exceeded by the volume of the discussions between the legislators.
What will happen now with the media law?
Although the ruling party had practically in its pocket the approval of the media law after the PC gave in to its position and confirmed its votes while waiting for the President of the Republic to veto the controversial article 72 introduced by Town meeting (AC), no one expected an extension in today’s session.
The vote on the media law is expected to take place tomorrow after the end of the session that will vote on the law. Accountabilitywhich will begin at 10:00 a.m. During the course of the session, a vote could be taken on holding an extraordinary session in the early hours of the evening, in order to once again discuss the media law.
The FA deputy, Sebastian Valdomirassured journalist Leo Sarro that today’s event completes “this troubled treatment of the media law, which now we do not know how it will continue.”
Source: Ambito
